mozda malo off-topic ali definitivno sa ZABOGA teritorije...
Go West
(Bosnia-Herzegovina )
A Comprex production. Produced by Samir Smajic, Ahmed Imamovic. Co-produced by Rade Serbedzija, Jozo Patljak.
Directed by Ahmed Imamovic. Screenplay, Imamovic, Enver Puska.
Kenan - Mario Drmac
Milan - Tarik Filipovic
Ljubo - Rade Serbedzija
Ranka - Mirjana Karanovic
By DEBORAH YOUNG advertisement
A courageous but awkward concoction mixing wartime drama, Western satire and a gay love story, "Go West" takes on more than one small film should. Pairing historical tragedy with a surreal comedy of disguise might work for a master like Ernst Lubitsch, but it's way over-ambitious for a debut feature. Adopting the bold, upfrontupfront directing that made his short film "10 Minutes" a popular festival winner, helmer Ahmed Imamovic knows how to hold the viewer's attention, and thus pic will probably win festival invites. Gay auds will take a look, but may not be convinced by what they see.
Kenan (Mario Drmac), a classical musician, is a Muslim; his lover Milan (Tarik Filipovic) is a Bosnian Serb. Given the prejudice against homosexuals in the Balkans, they keep their relationship pretty quiet. When war breaks out in 1992, they decide to leave besieged Sarajevo together. Forced off a train by Serbian militiamen, Kenan is sure he will be shot to death. To save him, Milan has the idea of disguising him as a woman, and miraculously manages to pass him off as his wife.
Up to this point scenes have unfolded like an old-fashioned WWII escape drama. The action switches to a surreal register, however, as they reach Milan's village in Eastern Bosnia, the land of the Bosnian Serbs. It has been built by his father Ljubo (Rade Serbedzija) on his return from Texas as an Old West town, complete with a wooden church (Orthodox) on the hill and a saloon serviced by the town floozy, Ranka (Mirjana Karanovic).
Naturally there are lots of oddballs running around, none of whom is particularly amusing.
It takes a major suspension of disbelief to imagine the lovers can pull the wool over everyone's eyes and continue to pass Kenan off as a bewigged "Milena." But in the farcical world the film has now entered, everything is possible, even a surprise wedding that Ljubo springs on the couple in the hopes of having a grandson.
At the same time, Imamovic asks us to absorb frightening displays of mindless nationalist hatred, along with the horror of an adjoining Muslim village where all the inhabitants, children included, have been massacred. Milan is forced to join the army, and Kenan is left to fend for himself in his flimsy female disguise.
This clumsy back-and-forth between historical tragedy and grotesque comedy just stops working after a while. Motivation is also iffy. Early on, Ranka has been established as a sex-starved woman, and Karanovic is a fine enough actress to suggest she has a dark past that has driven her to this mania. When she discovers Kenan is a man, she seduces him not once but several times. Script now introduces a jealousy motive to explain why she wants to destroy his relationship with Milan.
Young Drmac wanders uncertainly through a role that requires him to be sensitive, effeminate, self-centered and hedonistic, while the generally more solid Filipovic (who also plays a gay character in the new Bosnian comedy "Well-Tempered Corpses") is under-motivated in a crucial quarrel scene with Drmac. Though faced with a wild and woolly role, Serbedzija skilfully turns Ljubo around to end the film on a note of intense, convincing pain.
Jeanne Moreau, who is credited as an associate producer on the film, offers a strange final cameo as a French TV interviewer.
Camera (color), Mustafa Mustafic; editor, Andrija Zafranovic, Mirsad Tabakovic; music, Enes Bure Zlatar; production designer, Kemal Hrustanovic; costume designer, Ljiljana Sakovic; associate producer, Jeanne Moreau. Reviewed at Sarajevo Film Festival (Open Air Screenings), Aug. 26, 2005. (Also in World Film Festival, Montreal.) Running time: 95 MIN.
With: Haris Burina, Nermin Tulic, Almedina Leleta.
